The Marcomanni were a Germanic people who lived close to the border of the Roman empire, north of the River Danube. They were one of the most important members of the powerful cluster of related Suebian peoples in this region, which also included the Hermunduri, Varisti, and Quadi along the Danube, and the Semnones and Langobardi to their north, and they were particularly important to the Romans. They appear in Roman records from approximately 60 BC until about 400 AD.
Pannonia was a province of the Roman Empire bounded on the north and east by the Danube, on the west by Noricum and upper Italy, and on the southward by Dalmatia and upper Moesia. It included the modern regions western Hungary, western Slovakia, eastern Austria, northern Croatia, north-western Serbia, northern Slovenia, and northern Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The Quadi were a Germanic people during the Roman era, who were prominent in Greek and Roman records from about 20 AD to about 400 AD. By about 20 AD they had a kingdom centred in the area of present-day western Slovakia, north of the Roman border on the Danube river. After probably first settling near the Morava river the Quadi expanded their settlements eastwards over time until they also stretched into present day Hungary. This was part of the bigger region which had been partly vacated a generation earlier by the Celtic Boii. They were the easternmost of a series of four related Suebian kingdoms that established themselves near the river frontier after 9 BC, during a period of major Roman invasions into both western Germania to the northwest of it, and Pannonia to the south of it. The other three were the Hermunduri, Naristi, and the Quadi's powerful western neighbours the Marcomanni. Despite frequent difficulties with the Romans, the Quadi survived to become an important cultural bridge between the peoples of Germania to the north, the Roman Empire to the south, and the Sarmatian peoples who settled in the same period to their east in present day Hungary.
Carnuntum was a Roman legionary fortress and headquarters of the Pannonian fleet from 50 AD. After the 1st century, it was capital of the Pannonia Superior province. It also became a large city of approximately 50,000 inhabitants.
Limes is a term used primarily for the Germanic border defence or delimiting system of Ancient Rome marking the borders of the Roman Empire. The term has been extended in modern times to refer to the frontier defences in other parts of the empire, such as in the east and in Africa.
Komárno, colloquially also called Révkomárom, Öregkomárom, Észak-Komárom in Hungarian, is a town in Slovakia at the confluence of the Danube and the Váh rivers. Historically it was formed by the "old town" on the left bank of Danube, present day Komárno in Slovakia, and by a "new town" on the right bank, present day Komárom in Hungary, which were historically one administrative unit. Following World War I and the Treaty of Trianon, the border of the newly created Czechoslovakia cut the historical, unified town in half, creating two new independent towns in two countries. Komárno and Komárom are connected by the Elisabeth Bridge, which used to be an official border crossing between Slovakia and Hungary until border checks were lifted due to the Schengen Area rules. In 2020, a new road bridge was opened.
Hainburg an der Donau is a town located in the Bruck an der Leitha district in the state of Lower Austria of eastern Austria. In 2021 it had a population of about 7,000.
Novae was initially one of the few great Roman legionary fortresses along the empire's border, forming part of the defences along the Danube in northern Bulgaria. The settlement later expanded into a town in the Roman province of Moesia Inferior, later Moesia Secunda.
The Pannonian Basin or Carpathian Basin is a large sedimentary basin situated in southeast Central Europe. After the Treaty of Trianon following World War I, the geomorphological term Pannonian Plain became more widely used for roughly the same region, referring to the lowlands in the area occupied by the Pannonian Sea during the Pliocene Epoch.
The Limes Germanicus, or 'Germanic Limes', is the name given in modern times to a line of frontier fortifications that bounded the ancient Roman provinces of Germania Inferior, Germania Superior and Raetia, dividing the Roman Empire and the unsubdued Germanic tribes from the years 83 to about 260 AD. The frontier used either a natural boundary such as a river or typically an earth bank and ditch with a wooden palisade and watchtowers at intervals, and a system of linked forts was built behind them.
Pannonia Prima was an ancient Roman province. It was formed in the year 296, during the reign of Emperor Diocletian. Previously, it was a part of the province of Pannonia Superior, which, along with Pannonia Inferior, was gradually divided into four administrative units: Pannonia Prima, Pannonia Secunda, Valeria, and Savia. This transition was completed by the time of Constantine. According to the Notitia Dignitatum, Pannonia Prima was governed by a Praeses.
Gerulata was a Roman military camp located near today's Rusovce, a borough of Bratislava, Slovakia. It was part of the Roman province of Pannonia and was built in the 2nd century as a part of the frontier defence system. It was abandoned in the 4th century, when Roman legions withdrew from Pannonia.
The Moesian Limes is the modern term given to a linked series of Roman forts on the northern frontier of the Roman province of Moesia along the Danube between the Black Sea shore and Pannonia and dating from the 1st century AD. It was the eastern section of the so-called Danubian Limes and protected the Roman provinces of Upper and Lower Moesia south of the river. The eastern section is often called the limes Scythiae minoris as it was located in the late Roman province of Scythia Minor.
The Devil's Dykes, also known as the Csörsz árka or the Limes Sarmatiae, are several lines of Roman fortifications built mostly during the reign of Constantine the Great (306–337), stretching between today's Hungary, Romania and Serbia.
Slovakia was partly occupied by Roman legions for a short period of time. Marcomannia was a proposed province of the Roman Empire that Emperor Marcus Aurelius planned to establish in this territory. It was inhabited by the Germanic tribes of Marcomanni and Quadi, and lay in the western parts of the modern states and Slovakia and the Czech Republic (Moravia). Part of the area was occupied by the Romans under Marcus Aurelius between 174 AD and 180 AD. His successors abandoned the project, but the people of the area became steadily Romanized during the next two centuries. The Roman influence was disrupted with the invasions of Attila starting around 434 AD and as Slavic people later began to move into the area.
The Congress of Roman Frontier Studies or Limes Congress is one of the most important conferences on archaeology in Europe. The conference takes place on a triennial basis, although there have been some exceptions. The first congress was held in Durham in 1949; the most recent one took place in Batumi, Georgia, in 2024.
The Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes, or ORL, is a 550-kilometre-long section of the former external frontier of the Roman Empire between the rivers Rhine and Danube. It runs from Rheinbrohl to Eining on the Danube. The Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes is an archaeological site and, since 2005, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Together with the Lower Germanic Limes it forms part of the Limes Germanicus.
The Pannonian Limes is part of the old Roman fortified frontier known as the Danubian Limes that runs for approximately 420 km (260 mi) from the Roman camp of Klosterneuburg in the Vienna Basin in Austria to the castrum in Singidunum (Belgrade) in present-day Serbia. The garrisons of these camps protected the Pannonian provinces against attacks from the north from the time of Augustus (31 BC–14 AD) to the beginning of the 5th century. In places this section of the Roman limes also crossed the river into the territory of the barbarians (Barbaricum).
The Dacian Limes is the generic modern term given to a collection of ramparts and linked series of Roman forts on the frontiers of the Roman province of Dacia dating from the early 2nd century AD. They ran for about 1,000 km and included the:
The Danube–Iller–Rhine Limes or DIRL was a large-scale defensive system of the Roman Empire that was built after the project for the Upper Germanic-Rhaetian Limes in the late 3rd century AD. In a narrower sense the term refers only to the fortifications between Lake Constance and the River Danube (Danubius); in a broader sense it also includes the other Late Roman fortifications along the river Rhine (Rhenus) on the High Rhine and on the Upper Rhine as well as the Upper Danube.
